After a bout of boredom nearly kills them, the Elite Four find a new way to amuse themselves. Flint wins the biggest bet, and Aaron and Lucian have to spend the night in the creepy Old Chateau now. Dust and ghosts; how much more appealing could it get?

A/N: Random idea
playing the game that sounded like a fun idea. Eliteundershippers,
enjoy yourselves.

This is a present
for Darkflame414, because she wrote me a story for my birthday, and
I' repaying the favor! Only, mine is a week (or two) late now, so
that kind of means I'm a little bit irresponsible with deadlines.
Sorry.

I want to own Lucian
and Aaron. But I don't, sadly enough.

The Elite Four are
widely known for being tough and competitive, and are famous for
being the toughest trainers in their region. Most people will tell
you that they are hardcore serious, and have no fun at all, and eat,
sleep, and breathe battles. However, these are also the people that
don't know about Strip Poker night, that Pool Party at Phoebe's that
lasted a week long, or the night that they all went to a night club
in Goldenrod, then crashed at the casino in Veilstone, and Aaron
experienced his first hangover.

Truthfully, the Elites
knew how to have a good time, and usually had more fun on a normal
basis than any usual trainer.

This particular night
was dull as usual, however. Bertha, Aaron, Lucian, and Flint were
sitting in the kitchen at about eight, sitting in various positions
of boredom at their dinner table.

Flint was leaned over
the table, his forehead against the surface, his arms stretched out
in front of him. Bertha had her head propped up with one hand at the
head of the table, while Aaron was slumped over at the opposite end,
his arms crossed and chin resting on them. Lucian was leaning back
into his chair, one arm hooked over the back, the other draped across
his stomach. For once, the entire building was so quiet, they could
hear the clock ticking.

Lucian had no idea that
they had a clock.

"So I'm really
bored." Aaron said, for the sake of conversation.

Or lack thereof.

"Way to state the
obvious." Bertha said lazily. Aaron was a master in the ways of
battle, and fairly bright, but his boyish charm prevented him from
being any smarter in the ways of common sense. Although he was only
18, he had the appearance of a sixteen-year-old, and the maturity of
someone twice his age when it came to some things. All of that aside,
there was still something that Lucian couldn't put his finger on that
he simply loved about the Bug Master. Though he'd never tell, he had
a bit of a weak spot for the kid.

"Hey," Flint's
voice suddenly cut through the awkward, bored silence. "how much
would you give me if I ate all seven of those bananas there?" He
was staring at the bowl of fruit the Elite kept for snacks in the
center of their table.

"Five bucks." Aaron
said. Flint sat up a little straighter.

"Throw in ten more
and I'll do it." He glanced over at Lucian and Bertha, who were
looking at each other.

"Alright, we'll each
pitch in five." he shrugged.

"But only if you keep
it down." Bertha bargained. "Or I'm out."

"Done." Flint
reached into the bowl, pulled out the bunch of bananas, and began
eating. Lucian was shocked at how fast that guy could breeze through
those bananas! Aside from that, he'd heard very bad things about
eating too many of them in one sitting; Flint wouldn't be leaving the
bathroom anytime soon tomorrow.

"You know, Flint,
this says so much about your sexuality." Bertha said with a smirk,
just to get a reaction. And a reaction she did get. Flint paused his
face-stuffing for a moment, winked flirtatiously in her direction as
if to say, "You know it, Bertha, Baby." and began eating again.
She huffed and rolled her eyes and slumped back against her chair
again. Lucian shook his head at that; They all knew Flint, and he
didn't swing that way. In fact, he didn't swing at all. Boy, girl,
tree, it never really mattered to him. Love was love was love.
However, he wasn't about to get into that.

Aaron slapped down a
fiver on the table along with Bertha and Lucian once Flint finished,
pushing the seven banana peels away from him triumphantly.

"Flint, you have a
black hole where your stomach should be." Bertha said, though she
was impressed. Flint glossed his fingernails on his sleeve
arrogantly.

"I know."

And that was the start
of their new entertainment for the night; eating various concoctions
for bets. While it was no surprise that Flint could eat just about
anything, it surprised them all when Bertha could stomach two tubs of
solid chocolate frosting, a spoonful of melted cheese, and chug an
entire liter of Durin Berry soda (Durin berries are known to be very
bitter), and caused Lucian to have to give up a third of his books so
she could borrow them.

Aaron was a teenage
boy, and so it was no surprise when he managed to drink an entire
bottle of hot sauce, and still go back for two tacos and a handful of
burnt popcorn. Flint was given three weeks' worth of his chores for
losing that one.

Then Lucian, the one
that most everyone figures would be the one to put his foot down and
draw the line at such tomfoolery, beat Aaron's bet and made him give
up three hours of his free time to give lectures to the aspiring
young champions for a week when he, spoonful by spoonful, ate the
entire, unopened bag of pancake mix powder they were saving for
Saturday.

Of course, after this,
Flint set to digging around the fridge, searching for something epic
to win it all with. Of course, after all the things they had come up
with before for the past hour, they didn't think he could do it.

He could.

"Flint, please don't
tell me you're serious." Bertha grimaced. Lucian had never seen the
woman so disturbed, and he had known Bertha for a long time. He
folded his arms.

"I don't think you
can do it." he informed Flint. "There is no way you can finish
that."

"I'm with Lucian."
Aaron, a good head shorter than Lucian, stood next to the older male,
his arms folded in mirror image. "You can't possibly finish that
without hurling."

Flint stood proudly,
the giddiest grin on his face, with a spoon in one hand and a jar of
month-old mayonnaise in the other. "I'm gonna do it."

"You wouldn't."
Bertha groaned.

Flint opened the jar.

"He can't!" Aaron
protested.

Flint stuck the spoon
in the jar and produced a giant, yellowish-white glop.

"He won't." Lucian
said, knowing full well that Flint probably would.

Flint stuck the spoon
in his mouth, and they all flinched.

"Just watch me." he
said through a mouthful of mayonnaise.

"Now, I know you have
an iron stomach, Flint, but you can't possibly finish that thing
without it all coming back up!" Lucian tried to reason when Flint
was about a fourth of the way through. Bertha shook her head,
avoiding looking at the horrific scene before her. Flint stopped,
swallowed what he had in his mouth already, and looked at Lucian with
a glint in his eye.

"Well, how about we
make this interesting then?" he asked. Lucian raised an eyebrow.

"How interesting?"

"Like..." Flint
tapped his chin with the spoon for a moment in thought before
grinning and pointing it at Lucian. "Like if I can finish this, you
and Aaron have to spend the night in the Old Chateau. Without your
pokemon."

Lucian was
half-expecting a crack of thunder or a bolt of lightning to happen
once Flint finished.

"The Old Chateau?
Like, the one in Eterna Forest?" Aaron asked. Flint nodded. "That's
nothing! We accept!"

Lucian's glasses
slipped down the bridge of his nose. An entire night? In a creaky old
house with a bunch of ghosts with Aaron?

Flint had a satisfied
smirk plastered on his face. He knew what Lucian was thinking.
Somehow, Flint just had this intuition of things that were never said
aloud. Lucian didn't know how, but he did.

"Wonderful." He
stuck his spoon in and kept going.

Another thing Lucian
would never admit was that he was terrified of ghosts. When he was a
little boy, a couple of his friends dared him to go into the Burned
Tower in Ecruteak City in Johto. Not really knowing what to expect,
he walked in confidently, because he was definitely going to show
them who was boss.

In short, he was
attacked by a fleet of Ghastly, and it scarred him. With that plus
the type advantage over his own psychic pokemon made them a fierce
enemy for him.

Suddenly, Lucian was
snapped out of his trip down memory lane when Flint tossed the empty
jar down on the table with a clatter, the spoon following shortly
after.

"He did it." Bertha
breathed. "That moron finished an entire–"

"Don't say it."
Flint moaned. "Please don't." His face was a grimace, but it
appeared triumphant, in its own sick way. Aaron groaned.

"Yeah, well, now you
two have to spend the night alone in the Old Chateau!" Flint said
around a thick belch, leaving him with a bad taste after. "So we'd
better head out before it gets too late and you're only in there for
like... an hour."

"Oh no." Lucian
said, his voice flat. "What a shame. Only an hour."

"Don't be sarcastic
with the boy," Bertha said, smacking his shoulder. "You agreed to
it, it's your own damn fault." Lucian glanced over at her for a
moment through slitted eyes. Could she even remember what had just
happened, and who had done the agreeing there?

"Actually, I did."
Aaron said. "Not him, so leave him alone."

"Look, we're all
tired and irritable, so let's just fly them over to the Chateau and
go to sleep. We'll feel better in the morning." Flint said, placing
a hand between them. Lucian rolled his eyes.

"Says you."

Xxxx

"You feeling alright
back there, Flint?" Lucian called over his shoulder. Flint didn't
bother to hide his glare at Lucian as they flew over Sinnoh. Lucian
was riding atop Bertha's old Staraptor from when she was a child
along with her, while Aaron was carried by his Beautifly through the
air. Flint was clutching the top of his Driftblim for dear life,
lying spread-eagled on top and trying not to look at the ground, or
the bet would be off. And Flint never lost without a fight.

"There it is!"
Aaron called out of the darkness, pointing at a large bunch of trees
that were the forest. Off to one side was a small opening of trees,
and at the top, a roof of some sort was visible, showing tattered old
shingles and bare sports with rafters showing through. The four of
them flew toward it, the cool night air blowing past them.

Sooner than Lucian
would have liked, they landed in front of the house in a small front
walk, surrounded by a splintery old, white picket-fence and overlarge
weeds where flowers once stood. They returned their pokemon, pocketed
them, and turned to look at the old building.

Standing there in the
moonlight, it looked almost pretty, in a regal, mysterious sort of
way. Two stories tall plus an attic, covered in what used to be white
siding. It was now peeling and the red shutters and trim were faded
from the years. Glass windows were covered with wooden planks, set in
with nails used by the owners when they shut up the house and moved
away. Shutters hung sadly by one hinge, if they hung at all. To top
it all off, the tallest part of the house was railed by black iron to
keep visitors from falling as they enjoyed the view.

Lucian wasn't fond of
it at all.

"Well, in you go!"
Flint said as cheerfully as a an that just downed an entire jar of
mayonnaise could. He went to the door, grabbed the handle, and
pulled.

There was a SNAPing
sound as he pulled, and the old brass knob came off in his hand. He
looked at it, surprised, as if he wondered why it dared do such a
thing. He turned it over curiously, and Bertha pushed him aside
before he could pull the other one off.

"It's a push door,
idiot." she informed him, using just one single finger to push open
said door. It went in with a loud creak, and gave way to a large,
gaping black hole. It didn't bode well with Lucian.

"Okay, your pokemon,
all night." Flint said. Lucian and Aaron dug around in their
pockets, produced their pokemon, and handed them all to Flint and
Bertha.

"But if you hurl, you
have to come back, no matter the time, and get us." Lucian
bargained.

"And if not, we'll be
here to get you around sunrise."

"Piece of cake."
Aaron mentioned, though he was visibly shaking. Flint groaned and
shook his head.

"Don't say that!
It'll make me sick, and you'd be cheating." he warned as Aaron and
Lucian both opened their mouths to retort. "And you wouldn't want
to cheat."

"Crap." they both
muttered. Bertha, tired of standing around, pushed the two forward
into the darkness, shutting the door behind them.

"And tell all the
little ghosties Flint said hi!" Flint called cheerfully through the
hole where the doorknob once sat. Lucian felt Aaron freeze next to
him, then grab his right arm and latch on. Lucian's face went hot,
and he thanked the darkness that hid it.

"D-did he say
ghosts?" Aaron whispered, suddenly not as confident as he had been.

So Aaron was afraid of
ghosts as well...

"He's probably just
trying to scare us." Lucian assured him as confidently as he could.
"Ghosts don't always live in old houses like everyone says they
do."

As they stood there,
their eyes getting used to the darkness, they were able to make out
more and more details. The floor was wood-paneled, and long, rich
purple curtains hung around the boarded-up windows. They were
threadbare and scratchy, and years of dust was turning them greyer
than they should be.

Two staircases went up
to the second floor, one on either side of them. There was one room
branching out in front of the staircases, but otherwise there were no
rooms until they followed the path to the hall from the stairs, where
multiple rooms branched off to form small guest rooms. Directly in
front of them, though, was a wide doorway shaped like an arch, which
looked like it was that big to accommodate large groups of people
entering at once. Lucian pointed to it.

"Come on, we might as
well have a look around if we're going to be here all night." he
said. "That looks like as good a place as any to start."

"M-maybe..." Aaron
stuttered, but followed anyway, not letting go of Lucian for a
moment. Not that he minded in the least, though.

Their soft footsteps
kicked up clouds where they went, sending years' worth of undisturbed
dust into the stale, musty air with every step. Lucian was beginning
to relax now, since nothing had popped out at them, nor had anything
tried to eat them yet. He might actually make it through the night!

They entered a long
room, with one big long table in the middle. Every seat sat in the
proper place at the table, placed in front of a shining silver plate,
now dull and tarnished with the lack of use over the years. Each
utensil was carefully placed, sitting in perfect alignment to the
rest of the table. It almost looked fake, were it not for the layers
of dust covering it all.

"Wow, they even have
an authentic crystal chandelier." Lucian said, amazed. "You never
see those anymore." He went over to examine it, leaning over the
table and pushing a chair out of the way as he did so. It made a soft
noise on the floor, but nothing other than its position changed.
Aaron glanced around nervously, but followed Lucian to the table.
Cautiously, as if it might bite him, he picked up one of the silver
plates and wiped it off with his arm, examining his reflection; a
thin teenager with thick green hair and the world's largest cowlick.
He stared, and his large green eyes stared back.

And so did a pair of
pale grey ones.

"AHH!" Aaron
screamed, dropping the plate with a clatter and whirling around to
face the man behind him. Lucian jumped a foot in the air and whirled
around as well, hoping Aaron was okay. The boy whipped his head one
way, then another, trying to find the culprit. Lucian, confused,
reached out and put a hand on his shoulder to calm him. He screamed
again at the touch, smacked the hand away, and buried his face in
Lucian's chest.

"Aaron, what
happened?"

"S-so I was looking
at myself in the p-plate, right?" he asked, pointing down at the
plate on the floor once he got control over himself. Lucian nodded.
"And I saw myself, but when I looked again there was this guy
behind me with old, wrinkly skin and grey eyes and he was staring at
me! B-but when I turned around he was gone!"

Lucian patted the boy's
back as Aaron hiccuped and went into another fit, trying to comfort
him. His own nerves were jumpy enough already without the boy
shouting about seeing things! He convinced himself not to believe it.

"Your mind was
probably just playing tricks on you." he reasoned. "You're in a
creepy old house at night without your pokemon. You probably just
psyched yourself out a little." Aaron stared up at him with
disbelieving eyes.

"No! I saw it! He had
a white beard and everything!"

"You didn't see
anything." Lucian said, firmer. Aaron's eyes bounced back and forth
between his before he turned a bit pink and nodded. He pushed himself
off of his superior and brushed his shirt off, coughing. It was so
nice to look like an idiot now, in front of him. Lucian must think he
was a total wimp now.

"Come on, let's head
up to the second floor then." he heard the man say. With his back
still turned, he nodded, and they left the room together. Aaron felt
the hair on the back of his neck perk up in that way that he felt
someone watching him, but he didn't dare turn around, for fear that
he'd 'see something' again and make Lucian mad.

They once again found
themselves in the main foyer, but took a left to the next floor.
Every step creaked with age under their feet as they moved, and when
they reached the top, Aaron saw two tracks of footprints leading to
the top stair. If anyone were to come into the house now, they might
be a little unnerved by the random footprints leading around the
house.

"Let's try this room
here." Lucian suggested, pointing to the first room with an open
door. Aaron nodded, even though he knew Lucian couldn't see, and
followed him into the room. In it, there was a filing cabinet and a
bed, and three pictures hanging on the wall. Unlike the rest of the
house, this room was carpeted, but a bare spot off to their left
showed a faded floor beneath it. He and Lucian stepped forward, and
Aaron suddenly felt a bit claustrophobic. The room was too small for
his liking.

"Wow, imagine what
kinds of things you would learn from the history of the papers in
this cabinet." Lucian said, more to himself than his audience. "If
only it were unlocked."

Aaron, however, wasn't
paying attention. Something about the room wasn't quite right. Aside
from the whole 'inside a creepy old house' thing, the 'hasn't been
touched in like a million years probably' thing, and the 'mysterious
old locked cabinet' thing, of course.

The pictures on the
wall were weird to him. Two of them were on the right side of the
room, hanging just over the bed, like normal pictures. Unless a
fourth had fallen down sometime in the past, the third picture was
hanging out of place on the wall. It was one of those eerie paintings
whose eyes seemed to follow you, wherever you moved. The more Aaron
stared at it, the creepier it became. It was of a man with dark
purple hair, sitting straight, with his hands folded and his face
stiff from not smiling. He was wearing an old suit, looking like it
was created decades ago. And he was staring straight at Aaron.

Aaron backed up a
couple steps, but bit his lip to keep from screaming out.

"Lucian!" he
whispered sharply, causing the man to look around curiously. When he
spotted Aaron, he raised an eyebrow. "Lucian, the picture!"

"What about the–"
he started, then cut himself off. The Picture stared at him too, and
in an instant, its eyes started to glow a bright red color. Lucian
backed himself up to where Aaron stood, terrified, and leaned over to
whisper at him, "What's it doing?"

"I don't know, but I
don't want to be in here right now!" Aaron said, backing up quicker
than before. He didn't have to ask Lucian twice! He fought the urge
to yell out at it as he ran out of the room, shutting the door and
leaning against it. Aaron followed suit, and both of them shut their
eyes, breathing hard. Nothing had happened, yet both of their hearts
were pounding, and their breath was heavy.

"Hello there." said
a small voice behind them. Both jumped at it and spun around, Aaron
giving a little squeak as he did so. A small girl that didn't even
reach Lucian's hip in height with long blonde hair that fell to her
lower back stood in front of them. She wore a small, light purple
dress with white lace and puffy sleeves. The material was torn and
tattered in a few places, but otherwise appeared fine. Her bangs,
though, were long and covered her eyes as she hung her head. They
looked down at her in surprise.

"Hello there."
Lucian said. "What are you doing in a place like this?"

"Where are your
parents?" Aaron asked.

"Will you play with
me?" she asked them. Aaron and Lucian looked at each other, then
back at the girl. Lucian knelt down to her level.

"Are you lost?" he
asked again. She appeared to look up at him through her bangs, but it
was impossible to tell.

"You won't play with
me?" she asked. Lucian tried to keep a level head. He was never any
good with younger kids.

"No, I just want to
know where you came from, little girl." he answered. She lifted her
head at him, and Lucian stumbled back a few paces, his heart
pounding. There were two shining red orbs where her eyes should be,
and they were staring right at him!

"You won't play
with me?"She repeated, her voice rising. Lucian stumbled to his
feet and grabbed Aaron, the both of them holding tight to the other.

"Let's get out of
here!" Aaron shouted when the girl's hair and dress began to blow
in some invisible wind. Her outline slowly began to glow a purple
that matched her dress, as did a few objects around in the hall.

"I second that!"
Lucian shouted, then grabbed Aaron's wrist and led him down the hall,
away from the girl.

"Watch out!" Aaron
shouted, just in time for Lucian to duck a flying drawer. Their hair
began to whip around their face in what seemed to be an indoor storm,
caused by the freaky little girl. Aaron checked over his shoulder,
then leaped over a vase that aimed at his ankles, meaning to knock
him down.

"What the hell is
going on here?!" Lucian had to shout to be heard over the roar of
the wind and energy in the house. Aaron looked at him as if he were
insane. How did he think that now, out of all times, was acceptable
for everyday conversation?!

"Shut up and run!"
Aaron shouted back, pulling Lucian down a different hall and slamming
the door behind them. They leaned against it, catching their breath
and slowly hearing the storm start to die down behind them. Aaron
wiped away tears that has streaked their way down his face, hiding
them from Lucian, who was paler than he had ever seen him before.

"You... you think
we–" Aaron started to huff, but Lucian quickly turned and slapped
a hand over his mouth. He put a finger to his lips and rolled over,
pressing his ear to the door. Aaron did the same, and they hardly
dared breathe as they listened to the sounds of light footsteps hit
the floor outside their hideout.

"Ma-ry had a lit-tle
lamb." the little girl said slowly, in time with her footsteps. Her
voice was eerily monotonous as she spoke, and stopped her singing
when she giggled. "Haha, that was fun! I wanna play some more!"

Lucian and Aaron looked
at each other with wide eyes at her words, and paled when her
footsteps stopped in front of their door. Lucian wasn't even
concerned that their faces were so close, a factor he would have
considered at any other time.

"Are you in here?"
she asked, putting a hand to the door. A pale, ghostly purple hand
came through the other side, right between their faces. Both of them
screamed and pushed themselves away from the door, clinging to one
another for dear life and watching in horror as the girl came through
the door the entire way, a manic grin on her face. Lucian saw a pair
of pointed canines in her grin.

"I'm too young to
die!" Aaron wailed. "I'm only the first member of the Elite Four,
and I've never seen a legendary pokemon, and I haven't told anyone
goodbye, and I'm about to be killed by a psychopathic little ghost
girl!"

Lucian stopped his
yelling and glanced over at his ranting companion, and saw tears
streaming down his face. This wasn't happening! He and Aaron, the one
he always liked best, were going to die, alone, in a big old creaky
shack of a house, because of some little girl! What a way to go.
Their gravestone would certainly be a sight. Two Elite members,
slaughtered by a little girl in a frilly purple dress. How ironic was
that?

Slowly, his shouting
stopped, and he managed to pry Aaron off of him. Aaron stopped
yelling abruptly and hiccuped as Lucian stomped over to the girl, who
was still glowing and swirling with the wind and energy surrounding
her. He planted his feet on the dusty floor and put fists on his hips
in what reminded Aaron of a very motherly fashion.

"Why are you doing
this?" he shouted, trying to be heard over the rush of wind in the
room. It slowed, but only slightly as the girl looked up at him
through her bangs, her eyes no longer glowing.

"The house," she
said, still emotionless. "is disturbed."

"I gathered that!"
Lucian shouted. "But leave us out of it!"

"I want to play."
she repeated. Lucian bent over towards her a little, his face closer
so she could hear.

"We don't! Leave us
alone! Besides, what could a little ghost girl want to play?"

At this, the girl began
to get angrier, puffing out her chest and snarling through her teeth.
Lucian tried not to pee his pants when he saw her getting bigger, the
wind picking up again.

"Dare you defy
me?!" she shouted, her voice getting deeper as she looked down
at him from her towering height. "Dare you defy this house and
its inhabitants?"

"I'm not afraid of
you!" Lucian shouted back, his eyes hard behind his glasses. Aaron
still sat against the opposite wall, quivering, but looking at Lucian
with a mixture of admiration and shock.

"Why are you doing
that?!" Aaron shouted. "You could be hurt!" Lucian glanced over
his shoulder at the boy, a gentle grin on his face.

"I guess you just do
some crazy things when you try to protect the ones you care about."
he said, using the cliché line he had read many times. Aaron's
cheeks pinked, and he watched as Lucian stood his ground against the
giant little girl.

"You aren't scary!"
he shouted up at her. "You can't win!"

And just like that, the
wind began to slow. The girl stopped glowing, and she began to shrink
down. Lucian's face didn't falter until she was back to normal size,
and she spoke. Not in the monotonous, dead-beat one, but a deeper,
slightly more human tone.

"We were just having
a little fun." she said in a male voice. "But you did disturb
the house."

"We're paying for a
bet." Lucian explained. Aaron could nearly faint at the perfectly
normal conversation Lucian was having with this demon of a girl.
"That's the only reason we're in here. We'll be gone by sunrise, if
not sooner."

"Make sure that you
are." she said, then began glowing a soft white. Before their eyes,
the little girl pulled apart into four separate shapes, all which
turned back into their original forms of three Ghastly and a Haunter.
All of them nodded in respect at Lucian before turning and exiting
through the still-closed door.

Lucian turned stiffly
and walked back to his spot, where he collapsed on the floor next to
Aaron, holding his head in his hands. Aaron turned and faced him
tentatively.

"Were you seriously
not scared?" he asked after a moment or two. Lucian lifted his head
and smiled tiredly at Aaron.

"I was terrified."
he admitted with a small laugh. Aaron dropped his jaw open at his
superior as he laughed.

Lucian returned the
hug, embracing the boy warmly before turning his face towards his and
placing a gentle kiss on his lips. Aaron's insides turned to ice, but
he tentatively returned it, as if unsure as to if he should or not.
Lucian pulled him closer, and Aaron took it as a sign that he was in
the clear, and pressed a little harder.

What could have been a
few minutes or a few hours later, the both of them pulled apart and
stared for a moment before Aaron let out a wide yawn. Lucian laughed
and pulled Aaron's head to his chest, holding him there.

"It's been a long
day." he whispered, and smiled when he saw Aaron already asleep.
"It's time for some rest."

Aaron's arms slowly
wound themselves around his waist and locked there, like he was
hugging a big teddy bear. Lucian leaned back against the wall and
rested his arms around Aaron's shoulders, hugging him there. The pair
of them fell asleep like that, in the dusty old house, and didn't
wake up until the next morning, when the sun rose.

Or, more accurately,
when the extremely loud banging on the old front door woke them up.

"LUCIAN! AARON!"
shouted a male voice that coupled well with the puffy red hair atop
its head. "WHEREVER YOU ARE, OPEN THE GODDAMN DOOR!"

Lucian woke with a
start at the loud rapping at the door, and rolled his eyes at the
loud voice it brought with it. Slowly, he tilted Aaron's head up and
pressed their lips softly together, waking up the younger Elite. He
awoke with a flutter of lashes, then hugged Lucian once before
letting him go and stretching.

"It morning already?"
he asked groggily through a smile. Lucian didn't need to answer,
Bertha did it for him.

"BOYS! OPEN UP!"
she shouted, her fists joining Flint's at the door. "THIS ISN'T
FUNNY!"

"AS YOUR CHAMPION, I
ORDER YOU TO OPEN THIS DOOR IMMEDIATELY!" called a third voice.
Aaron and Lucian looked at each other quickly: What was Cynthia doing
here?

Quickly, they left the
room and went down to the foyer, gold sunlight peeking at them
through the cracks in the boarded windows. They stopped in front of
the door when they heard voices talking.

"Are you sure you
heard screaming?" Cynthia asked.

"Yes, and lots of
other noises, too." Bertha confirmed. "Something was going on in
there, but couldn't get in! The door was shut tight."

"Why don't we try
using pokemon to open the door?" Flint suggested. "I could get
Infernape to Fire Blast it."

"Just what we need,
to burn them alive if the whole thing goes up in flames." Cynthia
said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "And if we try to knock it
down, the whole house could collapse."

"Then what do we do?"
Bertha asked. Lucian could hear the worry in her voice. Bertha was
worried? That was something you didn't see every day!

"We're in here!"
Aaron called, pulling the remaining doorknob on the other door and
letting in bright morning sunlight. After their eyes adjusted to the
brightness, Lucian saw Cynthia, Bertha, and Flint, all of whom looked
thoroughly shocked.

"You're not dead?"
Flint asked.

"You're okay?"
Bertha asked.

"How come you four
act so stupid when you're together?!" Cynthia bellowed. The four of
them looked down at their feet and Aaron quickly pulled the door shut
behind him. "I mean, eating an entire jar of old mayonnaise and
sleeping in an old, run-down house? You must be insane!"

"But they're all
okay, so it's nothing to yell about." Bertha said. Cynthia glared
down at her. Bertha may have had the advantage with age, but Cynthia
was her boss.

"Come on, I'll deal
with you back at the League." Cynthia snarled before turning around
and hopping on the back of a large Pidgeot. Flint tossed Aaron and
Lucian their pokemon before grabbing hold of his own Driftblim and
taking off. Bertha turned around and spoke to them quietly.

"What happened last
night? Flint broke his end of the deal, but we couldn't get into the
house, and there was screaming and banging, so we flew back to get
Cynthia. Is everything all right?"

Aaron and Lucian looked
at each other before turning to her and nodding. "Yeah, we're
fine."

Bertha shook her head
at the two and hopped on her Staraptor, taking off into the blue sky.
Aaron tossed out his Beautifly, then threw a pokeball at Lucian, who
caught it.

"It's Butterfree, for
the ride back." he said, grinning. Lucian smiled and called it out
before telling it to latch on to his back and fly him home, as Aaron
did with his Beautifly.

'We might have to
try that again sometime...' he thought as he was carried off.
'That didn't turn out too bad after all...'

A/N: AHH! It's bad
and rushed and way too long, and I screwed up their personalities
again. Maybe I'm just not meant to write these guys. That's kind of
too bad.

Anyway, happy
belated birthday to Darkflame414, who I hope doesn't hate this that
much. Especially because this was originally going to be an
Ignitionshipping fic and I told her that but changed it at the last
minute.

The author would like to thank you for your continued support. Your review has been posted.